Monochrome Shades: a ficlet collection
by readerofasaph
Summary: Collection of ficlets mainly focused on gen and minor characters (see character list in summary), intermittently updated. Part 1: Akashi Seijuurou is either the best or worst vice-captain ever. Nijimura Shuzo isn't sure which. Part 2: Haizaki has appalling coping strategies and knows it.
1. Ascendant (Nijimura Shuuzou)

**Ascendant**

He's either very lucky or unlucky in his assigned vice-captain. Time will tell, Shuzo supposes.

Akashi's not the sort of kid you expect to find in the basketball club. Admittedly basketball at Teikou is such a big deal that you get all types — kids who transferred to this school just to be able to say they played here, aces from other teams who change sports without having to be headhunted. The first-string is filled with athletes who could be doing anything at all and winning trophies left and right while they're at it, but choose to remain, practicing to the tune of the coaches' dreary anthem:_Victory, victory, victory._

Akashi, on the other hand.

Maybe it's more that Akashi's not the sort of kid you expect to find _anywhere_, never mind the basketball club. Helpful and polite and unfailingly observant. Has the coaches eating candy out of his hand. Has every female associated with the club — from the managers to the cheerleading group to the unofficial bevy of bento-making fans who attend every match — starstruck into submission.

Has the entire first-string and second-string terrified. (Shuzo sometimes wonders what Akashi said to them, that first day, when half the third-years were trash-talking the newbie regulars, but mostly he thinks he's better off not knowing. It worked, that's all that matters.)

"Is there anything you _can't_ do?" Shuzo asks, one evening after Akashi's managed to solve about five crises in a single practice session — two accidental injuries, a power outage, Haizaki being Haizaki, Murasakibara being Murasakibara, a dispute with the managers over the excessive quantities of laundry the club generates. Shuzo's almost feeling unnecessary as captain.

Akashi tilts his head. "I can't be you, I suppose."

Shuzo snorts. "I don't think anyone would want to be me, when they could be you."

"Perhaps," Akashi answers. He lowers his chin a little, and his eyes are half-veiled by the fall of his fringe, his smile wry the way it gets when Akashi doesn't want to give a straight answer (which is often).

Shuzo leaves it alone, just like every other time Akashi gets like this. He's only got a year with Akashi, after all. It's gonna fall to other people to discover what this kid grows up to become one day.

He's not sure whether he's relieved or disappointed to be missing out.


	2. Euphoria (Haizaki Shougo)

Ishida-_buchou_'s got that look on his face he gets at least once a week, the one that means he's remembered how much he hates Shougo but is trying not to show it. It used to only come out when Shougo baited him, but now Ishida's expression of suppressed loathing appears spontaneously every few days, even when Shougo behaves, and Shougo's been behaving for a while now. (Too long.)

The pathetic irony of it is that Ishida hates himself more than he hates Shougo. Hates himself for compromising his principles, hates himself for wanting to win so much that he's willing to compromise his principles.

It makes Ishida a joke but also entertaining, the way a lame pun is. Seijuurou, that short fucker, never held any principles that overrode winning and winning and winning some more. Shougo's fantasised a thousand times about rearranging Seijuurou's pretty little face so bad even his old man couldn't pay a plastic surgeon to fix it. But there's no satisfaction to be had in hating Seijuurou. It's never personal with Seijuurou. He's just the mouthpiece of Teikou, of fate, of God, of whatever universe decided to pick Shougo up and dust him off, then put him back down and flip him the finger.

Shougo drags his gaze across the basketball court, where the non-regulars are taking turns making shots. There's a fellow first-year at the hoop now, doing a pretty decent hook shot. That shot is just about the only asset that kid has; dribbling's mediocre, stamina is average, height and power are okay but it'll be third year before he makes the starters, if ever.  
He'll do for today's target.

The club members part as Shougo strolls up to the key. Takes the ball, which is yielded without a whisper.

He moves back, twice as far from the basket as the last shooter. Swings his arm, flicks the ball upward. Everyone watches it curve to the goal, crooked and perfect.

The kid looks like he actually is going to _cry_.

It's as good as being the right kind of drunk, as good as playing ball was before Teikou, watching the boy's face try not to crumple. Coach's gonna be mad but who gives a shit; Ishida's looking righteous and judgmental and filled with contempt for Shougo and himself but really that's a bonus.

Nobody is gonna do anything. He's not one of the Generation of Miracles, never will be now, but he was in the running once, and that's more than any of these limp-wristed fuckers will ever glimpse in their lifetime.

It's only when Shougo has come down to earth – after practice, by himself, cigarette glowing bright in the darkness of the school parking lot, that he wonders, as he always does, whether there'll come a time where _this_ is the only thing that'll work for him – a time when there'll be no forgetting in sex, in alcohol or exercise or weed or winning or anything else he's managed to try so far.

For sure he won't forget as long as he plays basketball. He'd quit the game, if only he could.


	3. It Makes No Difference (NijiHai)

**Summary:** Nijimura still sees Haizaki around sometimes.

**It Makes No Difference**

I see you around sometimes. You still haunt the usual areas: the games arcade, the karaoke lounges, the street courts, the park. As always, you're a flashy guy. Loud, conspicuous, annoying. Your girlfriends wear thick makeup and cheap perfume, and draw even more attention than you do.

Except for being tall, I'm ordinary-looking, so I usually escape your notice even when I spot you in public places. The one exception was last year, during the Winter Cup preliminaries, when our teams walked past each other. Our eyes met and I nodded in acknowledgment. Once upon a time I was responsible for you, and there's no point in denying that relationship.

You looked shocked at first and then your face went blank, as if to cover up your inner emotions. Your lip curled into a sneer. I wasn't surprised. You have no reason to be thankful to me or Teikou. Objectively I guess I could say that we failed you. I could also say that you failed yourself, and you failed us. All of those things are true.

I hear news about you, more often than I actually spot you in person. None of it is good news. I can't say that I ever expected you to mend your ways, but part of me hoped that you would, back then. That being said, boxing your ears was great stress relief when I was in Teikou, so I do remember that part of my time there with fondness as well as frustration.

In theory, I could have done more for you. But there was a lot on my mind back then. Mostly I thought about basketball, and sometimes studying, but it felt like whatever was left of my brain was too busy thinking about Aomine, and Akashi, and Kuroko Tetsuya and the Generation of Miracles. I barely had enough headspace to think about myself and my basketball and what I was going to do in the future, let alone about you.

So yes, I did the best I could for you. It wasn't very much. It definitely wasn't enough.

Maybe one of these days when I see you around, smoking or participating in underage drinking or motorbike racing or whatever stupid pointless thing you've come up with to whittle your time away, I'll punch you in the face again. I don't know if it'll do any good, but it was the only thing that ever seemed to work with you.


End file.
